It’s my turn…just saying

August 15, 2019

Dr. Madelaine Paschal

I love to write about wonderful people, especially wonderful ‘senior’ people. This time, however, I’m writing about a concern that I’ve had for a year now, because that’s how long I’ve been privileged to live in beautiful, special Quail Creek, right on the Quail Creek Raceway!

Where is Quail Creek Raceway, you ask? Well, if you live here, you drive on it every day. And if you live here, you know the legal speed limits of that long and lovely drive, which welcomes you and all your guests to enter this great place. And, if you live here, you have probably witnessed the unbelievable speed at which most vehicles gain as they proceed ‘up it’ or ‘down it!’

By now, you’re probably asking yourself, “What business is it of hers, and why does she care? Who does she think she is?” Well, you’re right. I have no right, other than the fact that I have tried to cross the ‘raceway’ a thousand times to take myself or my two little dogs for a walk by our serene, well-cared-for lake and as many times, have almost been a fatality!

In fact, my eighty-five-year old husband fell one day as he was scurrying across, trying to outrun a cement truck, and just as he began to step up on the curb, he fell flat on his face. He couldn’t get up. And no, that’s not your problem, it’s his…ours. He has loved to walk all his life and is still pretty good at it (it’s the curbs that take a beating…just kidding!), but not that day, not that time. He held out hope for about forty minutes that someone would see him, feel sorry for him or just be curious about why the old fellow was wallowing around on the ground, groaning. Not one car, not one pickup and not one heavy-duty construction vehicle stopped. How could they? Their speeds exceeded their eyes and their hearts.

Well, I don’t have any business complaining, you’re right. I chose my just-right-home-for-an-aging-couple-with-two-dogs in this just-right-community-for-happily aging-people, in this just-right-wonderful-town of Green Valley…and I’m glad I did. I thank God every day!

So, I guess, I’ll just continue to ‘walk briskly,’ as fast as my ‘senior’ legs will carry me, across the Quail Creek Raceway and hope and pray each time that I do, I’ll return to our ‘little slice of heaven’ in my current body form, unaltered, unscathed and intact. And I pray for each saunterer, walker, jogger and dog-lover, that they’ll do the same.

But in my naiveté as to how things work, run or get done in this great community of ours, would it be too much to ask to have each of us do some serious thinking about how fast we drive? After all, we’ll all get to heaven eventually. I’d just like to get there on God’s clock, not someone else’s.